Bad Decision, Interesting Take

This sounds more hopeful than expectant, but about as good as one can do to try and feel better about the rather horrible Supreme Court decision in favor of Hobby Lobby.  Essentially: the made up religious liberties of a business/corporation trump the civil liberties of its employees.

There really isn't any logical way to back the majority's decision.  One can hope that future cases will show what a horrid bit of legalese they've released upon the world and it will be overturned, but I have a hard time seeing that happening in my lifetime.  While our country and its people have become much more accepting in the last couple decades, it seems that our institutions are stuck at the turn of the [last] century.  It's no wonder people's confidence in all parts of government (and corporations) is in the toilet.

Must Read

Infuriating and disturbing, but everyone should read this.

More Like Petulant Children

Yes, as Atrios says, "Libertarians is Weird" but Libertarians are a really odd group of people predominantly made up of 16-year-old boys (well, white male college stoners) and petulant man-children, and it's the latter that really hold sway.  Pretty much any Libertarian story could be replaced with "mine, gimme, you can't make me, no..." without changing it significantly.  

There are aspects of Libertarianism that seem to apply pretty broadly (civil liberties, some level of property rights, marijuana legalization), but there's a lot of greedy, racist child that goes into the actual overall Libertarian movement--anti-tax, anti-regulation (often more specifically pro-pollution), anti anti-civil rights/voting rights act(s) (yes, really).  People like Cliven Bundy are not the exception among self proclaimed Libertarians, they are the median Libertarian.

Also, as a special note: most self-proclaimed libertarians are not, in fact libertarians.  A "real Libertarian" would be more strongly pro-choice than anti-tax, and it's odd how often supposed Libertarians are anti-choice.  

Distinction WIth Difference

Chris Satullo was talking on NPR this morning about not seeing why people are "ok" with Google and Verizon, et. al. having access to our private info and using it/selling it to companies to advertise to us, but are upset about the government having access to the same info. 

Now, he often takes a position that I disagree with, but in this case demonstrates a lack of awareness that is astounding.  I could rant on this for a while but there are two key issues that make a huge fucking difference:

1. The info that the private companies have is incomplete.  Google and Apple and Microsoft and Amex and Verizon...all have bits of data, and, yes, there is some sharing/selling, but only the government can really get a complete picture of a person through this aggregation of data.  Google can't get a warrant to force AmEx to give them data on sales made offline that they couldn't get access to otherwise.  The government can, so a much more complete invasion of privacy is involved.

2. More importantly: Verizon can't arrest you, detain you, put you on trial, or assassinate you (if you happen to be in, say, Yemen)...at least not yet. 

There is more, and more nuance but those two differences between the government having access to your private data and an internet company having access are very important and should have been very apparent to Chris Satullo before he went off on his daily rant.